87. Colonel Clarkeasked the Minister of Agriculture if he will confer with the Secretary of State for War with a view to amending the present unsatisfactory arrangement whereby the War Department fell timber without having to obtain previously a licence, though the amount so felled has to be included in the total figure allowed to the Conservancy by the Forestry Commission.
§ Sir T. DugdaleThe Forestry Act, 1951, places on the Forestry Commissioners the duty of establishing and maintaining in Great Britain adequate reserves of growing trees, and to this end a yearly quota of fellings is fixed in consultation with the Home Grown Timber Advisory Committee on which private woodland owners and timber merchants are represented. Under the Act licences are not required for the felling of trees on Government-owned land but special arrangements have been made with the War Office and the other Government Departments concerned. The Departments have agreed to notify the respective Forestry Commission Conservators about fellings they carry out so that the yearly quota of all fellings is not exceeded. As far as I am aware this arrangement is working satisfactorily.